Business Models for Sustainability Workshop
Tuesday 28th January saw The Future Economy Network take a wintery trip up to University West of England’s Frenchay Campus. The business breakfast workshop was attended by a diverse range of businesses keen to look at their business models through a sustainability lens. The workshop was kindly hosted by the Economics team at UWE. The network supplied sustainable pastries from their own eco-café, Future Leap.
Katherine Piper, Director of The Future Economy Network welcomed attendees, highlighting the benefits of joining the Network and also sharing exciting updates about The Future Economy Network’s Carbon Neutral Hub in Bristol, Future Leap. Katherine also briefly ran through the plans for The Festival of Sustainable Business (check out the video here). We set the groundwork for the workshop by starting with two introductory talks by Ruth Smith, Founder of Sustainable Results Lab, and Peter, Economics professor at UWE.
Ruth set the scene with her history & skills in sustainable business model development, having grown from working as an editor. From her experience, she learned of the continuous battle between a company’s values and the pressure to make profit. Ruth emphasised the importance of values within business planning. She used inspiring quotes from Gary Hanel, Michael Porter and America’s Business Roundtable to explain the triple bottom line theory and modern business’ shift from shareholder to stakeholder value. She mentioned the importance of the new accreditation B-Corp. Learn more about B-Corp at our upcoming event. Many businesses have a 30-40 year timeframe therefore are finally starting to implement the environment as an essential stakeholder. Ruth also mentioned the importance of emerging clean tech. Learn more about Clean Tech at our upcoming event. With her expertise in marketing, Ruth touched on the brilliant tools in the digital and marketing sphere. She did caution however, the need to be aware of the greenhouse gas emissions from digital technologies, which account for 4% of greenhouse gases.
Peter then introduced his workshop by defining the concept of sustainable development by design and introducing the associated toolkit. He discussed the concepts behind sustainable development, business models, and value, emphasising the importance of context and perception changing value. He then discussed the torchlight model in his paper with Glenn Parry and Nicholas O’Regan about developing sustainable business models, and gave an example of the model in practice.
After a quick coffee break, attendees split into 4 groups and worked through their company business models using the torchlight model. After an hour, the teams fed back to the rest of the group on their work.
The event concluded with some 60 second pitches from Garrett Creative, Solar Roofing Specialists & Halcyan Water, and some valuable networking. A huge thank you to the Economics team at UWE for hosting the event and providing refreshments. Without such support we would not be able to do these wonderful inspiring events.
